


Some Enchanted Evening

by dsa_archivist



Category: due South
Genre: M/M, Romance, Series: The Hours And The Days, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1999-04-15
Updated: 1999-04-15
Packaged: 2018-11-11 01:54:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11138871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsa_archivist/pseuds/dsa_archivist
Summary: This story is a sequel toAfternoon Delight.





	Some Enchanted Evening

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Speranza, the archivist: this story was once archived at [Due South Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Due_South_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Due South Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/duesoutharchive).

The  
Hours And The Days 7 : Some Enchanted Evening

(Standard, all-purpose disclaimer) All pre-existing characters are the property of the creators and producers of "Due South." No copyright infringement is intended. All new characters and situations are the sole property and responsibility of the author. 

**m/m relationship (again, nothing that needs a rating), some swearing.**

This story refers back to events in part three of this little saga, "High Noon," so it might help if you've read that one first. It's on the DS archive, but if you can't find it I'll send a copy to anyone who asks. 

# THE HOURS AND THE DAYS 7: SOME ENCHANTED EVENING

by Katrina Bowen 

"Ah, yes ... you see here?" 

Frannie glanced down impassively at the blood-red talon tracing its way down her palm. "What am I supposed to be looking at?" Peering over Frannie's shoulder, Molly looked down more eagerly. 

The fortune teller tilted Frannie's palm a little. "You've been disappointed in love ..." 

Molly poked Frannie in the side. "That'll be your ex. Didn't I tell you she knew her stuff?" Frannie and the fortune teller both ignored her. 

"... But there's a man in your future." The fortune teller looked up into Frannie's eyes. She went on calmly, "You haven't met him yet, but don't worry. He'll be along soon, when you're not expecting it." 

Frannie heard Molly take a breath -- probably getting ready to disagree, ready to tell this stranger that Frannie already knew who the man was \-- and she glared up at her friend. Molly shrugged and didn't say anything after all. 

Still turning Frannie's hand this way and that, the fortune teller went on. "And a family matter is due for a resolution --" 

That was a little too much. Frannie took her hand back as quickly as she could without seeming to yank it away. "Really? I'm glad to hear it. Thanks." 

"If you'd like more insight into your future, we could try the crystal ball. It's only another five dollars ..." 

Frannie stood up. "No thanks. I think I heard enough already." 

"Very well." The fortune teller reached under the table and handed Frannie a sign. "Would you mind hanging this on the front of the tent? It's time for my break." She sat a can of pop on the table and started digging through her purse. 

"Sure." Frannie gave the sign to Molly and started to follow her out. 

"There's one more thing you should know." Frannie stopped at the entrance to the tent and turned back. The fortune teller took a few seconds to carefully open the pop can, and she examined her nails to see if she'd chipped the polish. She looked up at Frannie and for just a moment, her professional mask dropped. "He *does* love you, you know ... just not in the way you want," she said kindly. 

Frannie stared at her. Finally she said, "That doesn't make me feel a whole lot better." 

"I know." The fortune teller nodded. "But it's the best I can do, I'm afraid." 

Frannie walked out of the tent. "Come *on*, Frannie!" Molly grabbed her by the sleeve and pulled her along for a few steps. "So what did she have to say to you?" she asked urgently. 

Frannie pulled her arm free. "It wasn't important. She didn't know what she was talking about anyway. I told you all those people are fakes, didn't I?" 

"Oh, yeah? Well, Gina saw her last night, and she told Gina where to look for the car keys her boyfriend lost. You call that a fake?" Frannie didn't answer, and Molly rolled her eyes. "Geez, you've been talking about going to this carnival since they announced it. Now we're here and you're acting like it's a funeral. What's the matter with you?" 

"Nothing's wrong. I'm just not in a carnival mood, I guess." She pulled her jacket a little closer around her, even though the evening air wasn't that cold. 

"Yeah, I've noticed." The two women stood aside to let a group of kids run past. When they were gone, Molly turned to Frannie again. "You haven't been in the mood for anything except sitting around and looking depressed for a couple weeks. What's going on with you?" 

"Nothing's going on with me." Frannie shrugged herself deeper into her coat and stared up at the lights strung between the booths. They started to blur, and she blinked hard to bring them back into focus. 

Molly looked at her. "Frannie, I know how you act when there's nothing bothering you. Believe me, it's not like this. Just tell me what the problem is, okay? Whatever it is, you'll feel better if you talk about it." When Frannie didn't answer, Molly said, "Fine. Don't talk about it. Come on, let's go check out the rides." 

"Maybe later, okay?" 

"Look, Fran. If you don't want to tell me what's wrong with you, that's fine. But why should I spend the whole night watching you being miserable? We're here to have fun, right?" Molly demanded. 

"Well, no one's asking you to stay with me, are they?" Frannie started wandering down the line of tents and booths; even from a few yards away, she heard Molly's theatrical sigh as her friend walked in the opposite direction. Fine. That was fine with her. If Molly wasn't a good enough friend to bug her into talking about what was wrong, Frannie was better off on her own anyway. 

It wasn't like Molly would understand anyway. This wasn't the kind of thing she could talk about with any of her girlfriends. Shit. If she hadn't spent the past two years telling them all that she'd really found the man of her dreams this time, if they hadn't kept on giving her ideas on how to catch Benton's interest, it might be different. Then again, with her luck, they probably knew by now. Hell, all of Chicago probably knew about it. Even her own *mother* knew before she had. 

Would it have been that difficult for Ma to say something more -- more specific? Sure, she'd kept on telling Frannie not to chase Benton, that things wouldn't work out between them, but that hadn't been much of a clue. What would have been wrong with "Francesca, cara, give it up. I'm afraid Benton's in love with your brother"? It would have been blunt, and it would have hurt like hell ... but she could have stopped making an idiot of herself, making passes at a man who'd never be interested in her. She could have gotten out of the whole mess with a little dignity. 

Frannie stopped to lean against a counter at a concession stand and stare at the passing crowd. She'd halfway expected to spend most of the evening here while Molly loaded up on cotton candy, anyway. She watched groups and families and couples, parting and coming together and parting again. The embarrassment of knowing she'd been an idiot was bad enough, but Frannie knew she'd get over that in time. She'd done stupid things before and survived. If Benton was gay, then he was gay and there wasn't a thing she could do about it. 

What she couldn't live with was Ray never telling her how *he* felt about Benton. After all the times she poured her heart out to him, all the alternating misery and hope of being in love with Fraser ... sometimes he'd been sympathetic, and sometimes he hadn't, but he always seemed to wind up saying the same thing. "I know how you feel, Frannie." Oh, he'd known exactly how she felt about the Mountie, didn't he? And Frannie never figured it out, never put two and two together. Never put Benton and Ray together. 

Now what was she supposed to do? She loved her brother, and she hadn't gotten over loving Benton. What, was she supposed to sit down to dinner with them and pass the vegetables and make conversation like nothing ever happened? How was she supposed to watch them -- 

Oh, God. Frannie tensed up. There they were, walking along like they had any right to be there without warning her. Walking along like they'd never done anything to hurt her. Ray grinned and pointed at something in one of the booths; Benton looked over, one corner of his mouth quirking up in a smile, and whatever he said made Ray laugh. Of all the inconsiderate, self-centered things they could have done ... How *dare* they come here? It wasn't fair. 

They'd see her in another minute, and there was no way she was going to talk to either of them. Frannie turned and pushed through the crowd, just wanting to get out of sight. She hurried in the direction Molly had gone ... maybe she could find her, talk her into going home now. 

Frannie slowed down, defeated. There was no way she could find anyone in the press of people surrounding her. She knew she was being unreasonable. She also knew she didn't care. The last thing she wanted to see right now was Ray being in love with someone she thought would love her someday. 

Frannie came to a stop in front of the beanbag toss. She stood off to one side, looking through the people playing the game, lost in her own thoughts. Someone came up behind her and she froze. She knew who it had to be even before she heard his voice. 

"Hello, Francesca." 

Her first thought was to ignore him. She wanted to walk away without saying anything, pretend she hadn't heard, let him think she didn't give a damn. Instead, she turned around. "Hi, Fraser. You here alone?" She'd been trying for nonchalant, but her voice sounded brittle in her own ears; she could only imagine how it sounded in his. 

Typically, Ben answered only what she'd asked. "No, I'm with Ray. I asked him to wait for me at the car ... I didn't tell him that I saw you." 

"You ditched him to come talk to me, huh? It must really be important." 

"Yes, it is." Quietly he added, "I told him I was going to try to bring him something to surprise him." 

Frannie closed her eyes and concentrated on not letting her face crumble. "Let me guess. You and I are gonna have a heart to heart talk, and you'll tell me that you think of me as a sister. Then we'll go back and I'll say hi to Ray and we'll all be a happy family again. Is that your plan?" She took a chance and looked at him. He stood there, looking handsome and miserable and determined. It wasn't fair. 

Ben took a deep breath. "Something like that, yes." 

"Figures," she muttered. It was just like him -- trying his best to make everything all right for everybody. "When you go back to Ray, just tell him you didn't win your little game. He doesn't need to know about this, does he?" She didn't wait for an answer before she turned away. 

"Francesca ..." Ben put a hand on her shoulder to stop her; and Frannie couldn't make herself shake it off. "Francesca, your mother tells me you haven't spoken to Ray at all since you found out about the two of us being ..." His voice died off. 

"About the two of you being lovers. You can say it, Ben. I know about it now, it can't hurt me any more to hear you say it." She wanted to scream at him, loud enough to bring Ray running so she could scream at him too. Instead she walked over to the corner of the booth so they could have a little more privacy. "I just need you to answer one question. How long were you and Ray ... together before I found out?" 

"Almost seven months." He said it simply, just giving her a piece of information, like that's all it was. 

"Almost seven months." Frannie nodded. "And how long did you love him before that?" That was harder for him to answer, and Frannie wasn't in the mood to give him time to frame it nicely. "It was a lot longer than that, wasn't it? You wanna know why I'm so mad? I was in love with you, Benton. I'm not ashamed of that." Her voice started to tremble, but she was beyond caring. "I told Ray about it, and I damn sure let you know. And you know what? Even if you didn't want to tell each other how you felt, one of you should have told *me*. Why didn't you? Even if you'd never love me the way I wanted, you should have been enough of a friend to tell me what was going on." 

Ben looked away. "You're right, one of us should have been brave enough to say something to you. I suppose ... we didn't want to hurt you, Francesca." 

Frannie pushed her hair back from her forehead and laughed shakily. "That's great. I hate to tell you this, but I would have been hurt no matter *when* you told me. Still, I could have coped with this whole mess a lot better if I'd found out that I never had a chance a year ago, six months ago, whenever. I wouldn't have spent all this time trying to figure out what it was about me you didn't like, and what I could do to change for you." 

Ben took a step forward. He started to reach out to her again, but let his hand drop. "Francesca, I never wanted to hurt you ... and I know Ray didn't. He's furious with himself for the way he told you ... he won't talk about it, but I know how much pain he's in. What happened between me and Ray ... neither of us was expecting it. It was never about you." 

"Yeah, I know that now." Ben's misery level was clearly going up by the second, but he didn't show any signs of abandoning his mission. Frannie rubbed gingerly at her eyes, grateful that she'd decided to go easy on the eye makeup for once. Geez, even facing her brother would be easier than having Fraser stand in front of her all night, looking so certain she'd do the right thing. "Okay. I'll talk to Ray. But I'm not promising anything, understand?" 

Ben's face split into a huge, relieved smile; Frannie almost turned around and walked away right then. It just wasn't *fair.* But she fell in step with him anyway as he led the way to the car, not really listening as he told her that he understood how hard the whole situation was for her, and how much Ray needed to speak to her, and a host of other things that she knew were true but that she still didn't want to hear. 

"Well ... there he is. Do you want me to go with you, or shall I ..." 

Frannie shook her head as she stared across the parking lot. "No. I think it'll be easier if you don't." 

"Ah. Yes. Well, I'll just -- I'll be back." He walked back to the carnival; even though she didn't watch him go, Frannie knew he was tossing anxious glances over his shoulder, and that they were equally divided between her and Ray. 

Ray was leaning against the Riv, arms folded, facing away from her. Frannie was grateful for that, at least. She would never have been able to cross the distance between them if she'd had to do it with him watching her, trying to act like he wasn't nervous or scared. Not when she knew perfectly well what he'd be feeling. 

She stopped on the other side of the car; her heart sank as she realized that she had no idea how to start talking to him again. Well, she should have known it wasn't going to be easy, and she might as well get it over with now. "Hey. You doing anything important, or can we talk?" 

Ray stiffened, and for just a second Frannie wasn't sure if he was going to look at her. But then he did, and that didn't make it a lot better ... at first he looked as unhappy and as hopeful as Fraser had, but whatever he saw on Frannie's face made him look away as he tried to react casually. Damn, it looked like it was going to be as painful as she thought it would after all. "No, I'm just -- I didn't know you were gonna be here, Frannie." 

"Me either." She shoved her hands into her pockets and leaned against the Riv. "Ben saw me ... he thought you and I should talk." In spite of herself, she smiled. "He doesn't really like to see people fighting, does he?" 

Ray snorted gently. "Nah. But he's probably watching to make sure we don't kill each other." There was a long, awkward silence between them; Ray broke it, saying almost too quietly for Frannie to hear, "I'm sorry." 

"What are you sorry for? You fell in love with him. I can't say I blame you ..." 

Ray stared down at the Riv, rubbing at a spot of dirt on the hood that Frannie couldn't see. "I'm sorry for a lot of things. I'm sorry for the way I told you ... I really blew it." 

"Yeah, I won't argue with you there." Suddenly, Frannie was too tired to be angry anymore. "Look, I know you probably think I reacted the way I did because I was jealous of you and Ben." 

Ray shrugged, and risked a quick glance at her. "I know that's not all of it." He stopped running his fingers over the car and sighed. Folding his arms, he leaned against his side of the Riv. "I should have told you a long time ago what was going on, Frannie. I was just ..." 

"You were just what?" Frannie asked softly. "You were afraid I was gonna freak?" 

"Well, yeah, that too. But I didn't say anything because I was afraid if I did, I'd lose you. I figured you'd hate me. So I kept on finding really good reasons why I should keep my mouth shut. And then when I finally did tell you ..." Ray trailed off. 

Frannie picked up the thought for him. "When you finally told me I blew up, and you thought I'd never speak to you again." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Ray, I don't think I've ever felt that \-- that betrayed. It's not about you and Ben being together, I can live with that. It's knowing that neither of you trusted me to handle it. That hurts a lot, and I can't pretend it doesn't." 

"Yeah. Frannie, I'm sorry. I don't know what else to say. I just ... I just want us to get back to how we were before, ya know?" He looked down. "I know it's probably not enough, but I can't think of anything else to say but I'm sorry." 

Tilting her head to one side, Frannie considered her brother. To her surprise, she realized that it *was* enough. "Look, it's getting late. We can talk about this tomorrow, okay?" 

"Yeah. Sure." Ray nodded. He gestured to the Riv. "You want a ride home? I can go and find Benny if you want to leave now --" 

Frannie thought about it for a few seconds, then shook her head. "No, I came with Molly. I'd better try to find her -- if I know her, she'll be by the concession stand. She's got a serious sugar habit." 

"Okay. I'll see you at home then?" 

"Yeah." She briefly considered walking around to give him a hug, but decided against it ... that might be a little too much for either of them right now. "I'll see you later, okay?" Ray just nodded, and that was enough too. 

She started back towards the carnival. Ben was waiting for her at the entrance, standing not quite at attention. "Did everything ... well. I guess I probably shouldn't ask ..." He looked down at the ground, embarrassed. 

Once again, Frannie found herself smiling. "Ben, it's okay. We're gonna work things out one way or another. We always do." He still looked uncertain, so she went on. "Ray and I fight. It's just something you'll have to get used to, okay?" 

Ben looked searchingly into her eyes, then grinned. "I'll do my best, Frannie." 

"Good. I came here with a friend, so I'd better try to find her." 

"Oh, would you like me to help you?" He asked the question eagerly and automatically, and Frannie smiled again. 

"That's okay, Ben, I know where she's going to be. And Ben?" She took a deep breath and plunged ahead. "I haven't told Ray this yet, but ... I'm happy for you guys." She walked away without waiting for an answer. There'd be time for that later. There'd be time for a lot of things now. 


End file.
